Happy New Year.

I hope you've had a good Christmas, and let's hope this new year, 2020, is much better than the last, mm?

Warning - a scene of sex up ahead. Also, there's a scene inspired by Who Framed Roger Rabbit? ahead.

I don't Harry Potter.


The Hell of Fourth Year.

Charlotte smirked, or at least she performed the cat-version of a smirk, as she approached the muggle neighbourhood. The neighbourhood was one of the more affluent ones in London, and Charlotte was hoping the pickings would be really good. She padded gently through the streets, ignoring the muggles as they did their daily business although she did let a few muggles touch her. Some of them who did stroke her did it too roughly, making her hiss at them since their strokes had made her uncomfortable.

As with the magical world, the muggle world was horrified when they saw that she only had one eye. More than once Charlotte had heard someone comment on it but thanks to her cat form she didn't have to answer them back, although that would definitely break the Statute of Secrecy. After one muggle woman had patted her gently and stroked her back gently all the way down to the tip of her tail, she had heard the woman say something about her eye; ever since she'd arrived in this neighbourhood, she had heard so many comments and questions about her eye, and what could have happened to a beautiful cat like her, even if she was not a true cat, to make her lose her eye.

Charlotte had groaned mentally each and every time it had happened; it was bad enough the most recent articles printed in the Daily Prophet (a sadistic part of her couldn't wait to read the letter she was going to get back and what she had ordered to be sent to her from the stupid editor himself of that equally stupid paper, but truthfully Charlotte was in two minds about what she would do in the long term, but she was going to make the Prophet regret their decisions to print those juicy articles about her) couldn't seem to stop speaking about the loss of her eye.

She was getting seriously tired of it. Surely they had milked it enough?

Apparently not.

It also didn't help that they kept going on about her wand, making assumptions about her. The newspaper she'd gotten only this morning was full of them, using the First Task as the 'proof' that the fabled Girl Who Lived, last of the noble Potter family, a family devoted to the light of magic, was now dark.

It never occurred to the idiot reporters who kept saying that her parents would be ashamed if they were still alive to witness their daughter using such dark methods to get through the tasks, blissfully unaware that their words would cause more harm for their paper until it was way too late, but at least the muggles were innocent. The magical half of the human race didn't give a thought about the pain she'd endured, they just wanted to live with their blinders on and make snide pointed remarks about how evil she was becoming.

But even the muggles were irritating.

Some of them had made several suggestions. One person had asked her rhetorically, knowing she could not reply, if a sick cat-hater had done something to her. In her mind Charlotte had merely thought to herself the suggestion was a good one, although it would need to be definitely reworded; instead of a cat hater, the bitch who had slashed her eye had hated her and hadn't realised the consequences of what she had been about to do.

Charlotte had gone over the incident many times and she had come to realise, especially after she had calmed down and was healed by the Founders and Dobby and Winky, what Susan Bones had done to her was just another example of how badly Dumbledore's tenure at Hogwarts had caused more harm than good.

But she had known for a long time none of the teachers actually bothered to punish the students. At least with nothing really long term. None of the teachers had problems issuing punishments like lines, detentions, or things like that, and Charlotte had found herself in detention more than once during her time, mostly because she had taken the fall for an incident or she had been found in a place at the wrong time, but other than that there were very few detentions she had taken which were ones which weren't meaningless.

Charlotte had lost count of the number of times she had taken detention for stopping a bully or something like that. Bullying was one thing she had never liked, mostly because she had often been a victim of it when she'd been much younger. Dudley had made her life at Primary school a living hell, he and his gang of neanderthals had terrorised her before she had killed the leader of their little posse, and as a result, she had never liked bullies. She'd encountered a few others here and there, especially when she had gone into care, and she wasn't surprised to encounter more bullies at Hogwarts. But she had lashed out at them, delivering terrible injuries along the way.

In one case, she had seen another first-year be picked on by older students. Charlotte had wanted to step in only for Hermione Granger to stick her nose in, but Charlotte had followed the other girl's advice and told a teacher.

The result?

Nothing.

The students continued to harass the first year. Charlotte had then taken the law into her own hands, realising the teachers were complete wimps. She had cursed them quite badly, and she had been put into detention, but she had spat at the teachers, asking them why they didn't punish the bullies as she had foolishly expected.

Again, they didn't reply.

It figured that the magical world was just as disappointing as the muggle one when it came to stopping this sort of thing, but what made it worse was Dumbledore's blanket policy of forgiveness was doing more harm than good, and as the generations of students left the hallowed halls of what was once a great school, they were having children and were basically taught to bow their heads and give power to the bullies. Now no-one outside the magical world seemed interested in doing anything.

The Death Eaters and their sick master was an extreme example of how the magical world just bowed their heads meekly in the face of bullies and didn't lift a finger to stop it. But what Susan Bones had done to her was just as terrible since the girl had lashed out in anger, and Charlotte had little doubt in her mind the other girl had expected the effects to not be as bad as they were.

No, not bad, awful.

Thinking of her eye made Charlotte mentally hope the eye currently being grown by Ravenclaw and Slytherin was ready soon. If having to cope with a single eye as a human wasn't bad enough, it was hard as a cat, especially since she needed both eyes to help her see the route ahead if she was balancing on a tree branch or the top of a fence. The Founders had mixed feelings about her current decision to commit a number of burglaries in Muggle London, but Charlotte didn't care. As she had told Helga and Godric, the only two were more vocal about her using her magical abilities to commit crimes, her reasons for committing heists was simple.

"Godric, Helga; I've been a burglar for a long time. It's the only way of making a living I know. Yeah, I know there are other ways of making a living. I've been thinking of becoming a Curse-Breaker, and thanks to private study because Dumbledore meddled in my education, probably deeming the profession not for me, the Girl who Lived," Charlotte had said to them, "but I have trained to be a burglar for much of my life. It's a part of me. I can't just throw it away."

Charlotte wasn't exaggerating. She was telling the truth. When she had first left Privet Drive, she had been forced to be a thief although she had stolen things in the past before that night in Number 4 when she had murdered the people Dumbledore had left her with even if it was a stupid error in judgement. She had started out small and she had grown stronger in her skills as a burglar, beginning as a lowly pickpocket and simple thief and rose higher and higher up the ladder. She had changed over from sneaking around, following people taller than her after she had seen them slide their wallets or purses back out of sight, where they assumed wrongly their cash would be safe, to travelling through various neighbourhoods and studying the different houses, seeing which ones looked like viable targets and which ones looked like they would be nothing but trouble for her to handle.

Charlotte came out of her thoughts violently when the sound of a motorcycle tearing through the streets made her turn her head quickly, and her one-remaining eye widened in horror when she caught sight of a figure sitting atop a motorcycle as tall as a mountain from her transformed point of view, came roaring towards her.

Charlotte yowled and leapt back onto the pavement just as the muggle sped past her. The cyclist never even saw her.

Focus on the job, you idiot! Charlotte thought to herself, and she took a deep breath - well, deep for a cat - and she crossed the road again, this time making sure her head was not stuck in the clouds as it had been before.

This time she made it across the road and she slipped in through the back of a row of houses. The cat which was Charlotte crept silently down the alley, sniffing the air, wrinkling her nose at the mixture of the unpleasant stench of the garbage from the different houses which was made worse as the heat from the sun cooked the bags in the bins, and the stench of equally cooked vegetation. But she ignored it as she crept along, slipping through the gaps of a gate as effortlessly as if she had stepped through a room.

She paused next to a bin and she crouched down and jumped onto the top, inwardly wincing at the stench before she pushed it aside and lightly jumped onto the fence. One of her front paws slipped slightly, but she was quick to compensate by using her claws to grapple on.

That Amelia Bones better not bring her bitch of her niece around, Charlotte angrily thought to herself as she righted herself, otherwise I am going to murder her. Oooh, for two eyeballs again!

Still dreaming about the thought of being able to see with two eyes instead of just the one, and having to use a separate means of being able to see to compensate for the single point of view, Charlotte looked around the back garden. She inwardly smiled when she saw the backdoor was open and most of the family was outside, having a barbecue.

Charlotte would have smiled if she had been in human form when she watched as the man she presumed was the father played with three kids, two girls and a boy, and they were laughing with joy.

I could have had that as a kid, growing up, with parents. A family…., she thought to herself, but she quickly pushed those thoughts aside as she focused on the job at hand (she hated herself for being jealous of this family; they didn't deserve it, and besides if her plans paid off, she would have children of her own soon enough. She didn't know if she was going to get married, but she definitely wanted children) and looked carefully over the garden as she tried to think of a blindspot she could use to her advantage.

She walked slowly down the fence to get away from the stench of the garbage, and when she found a clearer part of the garden where she could get a better sniff, she smelt the air. She cursed that she couldn't exactly pick up on any scent belonging to the family, but what annoyed her the most was she had no idea if this family owned a dog or not. Charlotte hoped they didn't own one; she'd had more than enough bad luck recently and she didn't feel up to dealing with a dog on top of everything else.

She spotted the blind spot she felt she needed. Slowly the cat moved in the direction of the house down the line of the fence.

XXX

In New Zealand, the woman sighed as she looked around the house. She and her husband had been trying to gather what little money they had for the return trip to Britain, a country they had both sworn never to return to ever again.

Not since…

She closed her eyes, unable to believe anyone could be so cruel, but she had been surprised.

She looked down at the photograph she and her husband had managed to acquire, showing Charlotte Potter exposing her empty eye cavity for all to see, and tears sprang to her eyes.

How anyone could justify that…it was unthinkable.

She sighed, wondering how Charlotte was going to react. She and her husband had little contact with the magical world, so they had no idea how Charlotte would react when they were reunited. They had given false names, living on the peripheral of magical society, but they were still a part of it enough to be allowed to view the Tournament. But after seeing what the girl had done, they were both worried that terrible power would be used on them even if they hadn't done anything to the girl.

XXX

Albus Dumbledore was pacing up and down in his office fretting. I just need to be patient, he continually told himself but as he did so, but it was hard. He had sent the letter he had spent hours last night drafting for Charlotte to read, and he truly hoped the girl responded. Dumbledore had taken on board what Poppy, Minerva, and Fillius had been saying about the girl, and he had also taken on board everything he had seen in the Tournament, and he had taken it from there.

The letter was only of small importance. Dumbledore had given standing orders to the teachers, Severus included, that if they saw the girl in the next few days, they were to either take her to Minerva so she could tell Charlotte about the Yule Ball and after that he had stressed he would personally wish to speak with Charlotte.

Dumbledore was not foolish in his instance, even if many of his ideas and decisions had been foolishly thought through.

He knew Charlotte was not going to like the thought of the dance, but he hoped his plan to have Charlotte dance with Ronald Weasley - he honestly hoped Ronald acted like a mature wizard during the Ball if he didn't then it would definitely cause problems for their long term future - even if he knew Charlotte found Ronald repulsive.

Not entirely news - even Dumbledore, who had taught personally many students over the decades, but while he had encountered many students given to gluttony, he had never encountered one who added gluttony with undeserved arrogance, stupidity, slovenliness equal measure. Unfortunately, Dumbledore knew Ronald was the only true choice if he wanted the last Potter (?) to live in the kind of life he wished for her, then so be it.

For the letter, Dumbledore knew he'd had his work cut out for him - this letter would require all of his diplomatic skill.

He had done his best to treat the girl as the adult she was now clearly even if it went against the grain because the girl, in Dumbledore's mind, was still a child; considering the wide gulf between their ages, that was unsurprising, if you looked at it.

But Dumbledore needed to accept the fact the girl was practically an adult. In any case, when he had written the first draft of the original letter, he had realised he was just going to have the request for a meeting go up in flames much like the majority of his plans for her. To get used to that, Dumbledore knew he would need to change his approach.

For a start, once he had read through the original draft he had seen he had been writing phrases which Charlotte would likely find patronising. At the same time, he realised he had added in far too many controlling phrases, also going as far as to say Lily and James would both be disappointed with her if she didn't agree to show up. Once he had read through the letter again, he had realised what he had done and he had instantly written it out.

If there was one thing Charlotte was unlikely to do, it was to take such an insult, and truthfully once Dumbledore had come to his senses when he had read the letter back to himself again, he had seen his mistake.

Well, the portraits of some of the headmasters and headmistresses had pointed it out for him, much to his irritation but he had taken the advice once he had taken it all on board.

Dumbledore knew the letter he'd sent off wouldn't be completely perfect, but if he could just get Charlotte to listen to him….

XXX

Where is she? Ron Weasley thought to himself as he stalked through the corridors - Hermione had not bothered to tell the redhead he was missing classes, although Ron hadn't worked out the reason - looking for Charlotte so he could find "his future wife," and "woo her with my charm."

I wonder if she's in the Great Hall, or the Kitchens, Ron thought to himself as the dim light bulb of the idea lit up in his head before popping. Confidently, he headed on his way to the kitchens before he realised he had no idea where the kitchens were.

As he walked down the corridors, however, Filch appeared around the corner. Surprise flittered across the squib caretaker's aged face before a grin spread across his face.

XXX

Charlotte jumped when she heard the sound of someone moving around downstairs. She went as still as a statue, listening out carefully for any signs of one of the homeowners heading upstairs. Fortunately, there was no sign of anyone immediately heading upstairs. The only sounds she could hear downstairs were pretty mundane; she could hear someone moving about in the sizeable kitchen downstairs, and she could hear the faint sound of water running.

She relaxed a little, but she stood a little more rigidly before she looked down at the bag she had her loot in. Four houses into the street and she had made a sizeable amount of plunder. She felt she'd made more than enough here, and so she picked up the bag and she transformed into her animagus form. She slowly made her way down the stairs and she slipped out of the house, thankful for her small size as she crept out of the garden.

After she had gotten out of the neighbourhood, after deciding that she'd had enough of this part of the world although she had every intention of returning to Little Whinging and burgle the old place.

In the meantime, she would head for some of her old stomping grounds.

XXX

Charlotte flinched as the sound of really bad pop music blared in her ears, piercing even the mild charm she'd discovered which could handle the task of dulling down the sounds so she could stand them better. Ignoring the sounds with some effort, she headed over to the bar counter. A young man, a few years older than she was with longish dark hair, looked up at her while he was serving someone else. His eyes widened slightly, and when he had finished with his previous customer he walked over.

"Chaz, looking hot as always," he drawled, gazing at her slim, petite body with obvious lust. "Still with the leather look eh? Where have you been? You haven't been here for a long time. What's with the sunglasses?"

"You know me, Dave," Charlotte replied with a smirk. "The leather's been my favourite for a long time. I don't see any reason to change. Anyway, I managed to find my family, and I moved away from London but I still come to the city once in a while. And the sunglasses…my eye was injured, and I don't want anyone to see it. It's recovering."

She wasn't entirely telling a lie about her clothes, but the last thing she wanted was for anyone to know the full truth about her home. Her eye? Well, that was private.

"Fair enough," Dave shrugged, but he couldn't take his eyes off of Charlotte.

Charlotte inwardly snorted. His interest in her was too obvious even if he wasn't the ladies man he thought he was, but once more she had to be thankful she'd inherited her mother's beauty. Still, this was going to be too easy.

She and Dave had a rather sordid history.

The pair of them had grown up together in the same foster home. Okay, he was a few years older than her, but only a few years. But where some boys and girls tried to be bad, Dave actually was; oh, he wasn't a psychotic 'bad' he was just a bad boy. When the pair of them had met in the foster home after she'd gotten off the streets, Charlotte and he recognised each other as kindred spirits even if Dave had never been at her level. Still, he knew quite a bit about what was happening in the underworld.

That was one of the reasons why she often visited him.

Another was for information. And she had found out the best way to get information out of him was to have sex with him because as he had grown older waiting for her to mature so then he could fuck her, Charlotte had only done it because getting information about new opportunities for thefts and heists was becoming harder. In the end, she'd needed to make a choice. And she hadn't regretted it since. Charlotte was not a virgin, she had lost her virginity after her second year at Hogwarts, and she had lost it to this guy who'd taken her several times.

More than once she'd lured him away from whatever he'd been doing, and then they'd had sex together.

At the same time, she had learnt a lot, and when she'd gotten her hands on her custom wands she had used magic to take what she'd needed. Charlotte regretted nothing.

With a smile, she leaned forward and she beckoned him over.

Dave smirked as well and he leaned in close so she could whisper into his ear without the music distracting them.

"Do you wanna fuck me?" Charlotte whispered.

She saw his smirk widen. "Oh, yeah!"

"Let's do it now. Get someone to take over from you for a few minutes, and then we can go out."

"Hold on, right now?" Dave moved back a bit to look her in the eye, stunned. "I-I'm working-!"

Charlotte chuckled and she pulled him back to whisper into his ear. "When has that ever stopped you?" she whispered. "Come on, just tell someone you're going on a break, or you have something to do. I don't care; I've been deprived of you for some time, and I thought we could catch up."

Dave swallowed a little bit, but he nodded and he headed off. Charlotte's single remaining eye followed him as he walked away, and saw he had wandered over to a woman wearing the same black and white barkeep uniform the club liked to have its staff wear, and he saw them chat for a moment or two, but Charlotte saw the exasperation and annoyance in the woman's body language.

She wasn't bothered if Dave had dipped his wand into other cauldrons, it wasn't her problem. In any case, they only had sex intermittently and it wasn't as if the pair of them were going to marry.

Dave came back after a few minutes of wrangling with the other bartender. "Okay, we can go. But I can only be gone about ten minutes," he added, looking at her nervously as he leaned in to speak with her.

"That's no problem," Charlotte reassured him. Ten minutes would be more than enough time for them to have a quick fuck and at the same time get information about the latest robberies that were said to be big although truthfully she had favoured robbing the Hatton Garden area, although she wasn't going to make the same amateurish mistakes as those old morons who had made left too many clues behind until they were sloppy. But at the same time, she wanted to get into a fight, one she could easily escape from.

Dave led Charlotte into a backroom full of junk. It wasn't the most romantic places, but neither of them cared much about that. Dave turned around and captured Charlotte's lips in a kiss. She moaned a little bit, deepening the kiss while she used her hands to stroke his body. She let her hands go down to his belt where she loosened it before unbuttoning his trousers until, within seconds, she had his trousers down and was gently using her hands to pull down his boxers where there was a sizable tent.

Charlotte pulled the boxers down and she caught Dave's cock in her mouth, gently using her teeth to stimulate him although she didn't bite down too hard.

"Damn it, you slut!" he moaned while he placed both hands on her head. "This is what I love about you. You sure know how to please a guy…"

Charlotte ignored the slut part and bobbed her head up and down the erect penis. She pulled off her leather jacket and then her shirt, exposing her breasts to him before she took off her bra. Her uniform at Hogwarts hid the size of her bust to all. They weren't huge, but they weren't small either.

Dave smirked as he saw what Charlotte was doing; she had slipped out his cock and she had slipped it between her boobs. She licked the tip of his cock while she rubbed his shaft using her tits.

He bit his lip when he realised he was about to come. "Damn it, Chaz," he hissed. "I'm gonna cum."

Charlotte didn't stop her ministrations although she placed his cock back into her mouth since she didn't want him to come all over her clothes. The deluge didn't take her by surprise, and she gulped down Dave's semen before she let it trickle down her face.

"Damn, Charlotte," he groaned, looking down at her in annoyance. "I was hoping to fuck you."

"Why are you complaining?" Charlotte replied. "Give you a few minutes, and then we can continue."

Dave rolled his eyes.

Charlotte sighed and she snapped out her wand deciding this was the best time.

"Wha-?"

Charlotte flicked his wand at him…

"Oooh, ooh, yes!" Charlotte cried a few minutes later while Dave grunted while he continued to fuck her. While Charlotte was moaning in pleasure as Dave fucked her, she thought hard about the news Dave had given her.

According to the grapevine, a gang was looking for a fence to exchange jewellery for hard cash. Granted, the gang weren't stupid enough to say anything about where this robbery was going to take place, knowing the police had informants everywhere. That was the bad news, but it wasn't unexpected, and it showed Charlotte and any other professional criminal living in this city this gang was either smart enough to cover their tracks which meant they were an experienced gang, or they were a bunch of newbies with a gram of common sense shared between them.

The good news was Dave, who was really fucking her after she had used mind magic on him to tell her the facts he was meant to study under mental coercion, did know who they were, and where they were based.

Even better, the robbery was going to be taking place either tonight or the next day.

Charlotte didn't care which.

"Oh fuck!" Charlotte cried out when Dave came inside her again.

At the moment the door opened and someone came in. "What the hell is going on?" he demanded.

Charlotte stood up and smirked as Dave made excuses, but the other man didn't like it. "That's it, you're fired! This is the sixth time someone's complained about you-!"

"That won't be necessary," Charlotte said, flicking her hand again while she waved her wand at them, freezing them both. She spent the next few minutes rewriting the memories of the other man, who was part of the managerial staff and with Dave so they wouldn't remember the use of magic and her wand. At the same time, she cleaned both herself and Dave before she flicked her wand at the pile of clothes, and within moments they had their clothes on again.

Once she was finished Charlotte flicked her wand again, unfreezing them.

"Dave," the manager said, "how many times have I got to tell you not to meet one of your girlfriends?"

"I'm sorry, sir," Dave fidgeted.

"Still no harm is done. Now take her out, and don't do this again."

"Right sir."

Charlotte wore a smirk on her face as she walked out of the room.

XXX

For the next two days, Charlotte watched the gang very carefully. They were just an ordinary group of people who didn't do anything suspicious enough to warrant scrutiny and they lived in ordinary houses and had ordinary lives, with jobs although they weren't married. To an outside observer, it seemed unthinkable they would do anything unlawful.

But looks were deceiving, as Charlotte was more than aware of.

But Charlotte had already met with one of the gang, using a potion to put one of them to sleep briefly so she could question him. She had learnt the gang were planning on committing the robbery on one of the jewellery shops in London. They had thought of committing the burglary in Hatton Garden, but unfortunately they didn't want to do that since those oldsters had done it before them while they were working out the basics, so they had cancelled it and opted to burgle another shop which was easier to get into.

Charlotte understood and appreciated the logic of that, but it made little difference to her.

On the night of the robbery, Charlotte had climbed onto the gang's van and used a sticking charm to herself, thankful it was pitch dark, so she wouldn't slip off and covered her face with a scarf. She didn't move a muscle while the gang quietly parked themselves in front of the shop, which surprised her, and she watched as three of the five-man gang slipped out and broke into the jewellery store while another went out to keep watch, and the last man sat at the wheel. Charlotte winced when one of the gang made a huge amount of noise just getting into the place while they used a blowtorch.

Idiots!

While they were distracted, Charlotte began counting. The object was to work out how many seconds it would take for the gang to get in, immobilise the alarms, and then begin smashing the place up before they returned to the van.

She had reached about 102 when she suddenly went rigid. She could hear the sound of sirens in the distance, coming closer.

What's happened? Surely the police couldn't have caught wind of this already, surely? Has the Hatton garden robbery and what I did with either the Louvre or the Tower made the police more vigilant?

Charlotte heard the man inside the van's cab mutter to himself. It was quite loud and audible enough for her to hear anyway.

"Are the police coming already? Hurry up!"

Charlotte grimaced. She had known from the moment she had questioned the man with that potion and a spell, the gang were new to this gig and as a result they weren't prepared for the potential risks, but she could understand them. Still, it would have been nicer if he calmed down but since he was on his own without anyone to reassure him, it was a disaster waiting to happen since he could easily start the engine up and panicking.

Fortunately the other members of the gang came rushing out of the jewellery store.

"How come the police are coming?"

"I don't know. Call Kev, ask him what's going on."

The gang member who was apparently the one on lookout came rushing towards the van. "The police are getting closer. I just saw a squad car."

"Right, in the van, quick," the guy who was apparently the leader snapped and they clambered into the van just as the shop exploded spraying glass everywhere in a hot burst of fire and smoke.

Charlotte looked at the remains of the shop in surprise wondering why they had bothered to do that, but she didn't have time to think about it as the van suddenly sped off. Charlotte didn't move much, thanks to the charm she'd used, but she winced at just how amateurish they had taken off like that. She looked over her shoulder, and she saw the squad cars coming closer and closer.

"Fuck!" she whispered, unable to believe how this had gone bad so easily and quickly. She hadn't expected it. What made it worse was she was uncertain if she could escape with what she wanted. She mentally cursed herself for going for a gang who would do the work for her, realising she should have done the job by herself.

But an idea came to mind. It was risky but it had to be done.

She slipped one of her wands out of her holster and she cast a wordless curse at the wheels of the lead squad car. A smirk crossed her invisible features although she didn't like the use of magic in this case. Her custom made wands lacked the Trace, but that didn't mean the Ministry wouldn't be keeping an eye out on the muggle areas and keeping watch out for all incidents involving magical use. Charlotte's status in the magical world was dubious especially with the outcome of the First Task, but she knew if she so much as broke the Statute even slightly despite the precautions she took every time she committed a theft and needed to perform magic, her life would not be worth living. Even worse, it would reveal to everyone what she was in the muggle world, and she did not want that.

Charlotte knew she could be an animagus or she could render herself unseen to the muggles, but she knew she needed to be careful and could not afford to be too casual about her activities. But still, it was satisfying to watch the police car spinning out of control, skidding into the pavement and causing congestion. She turned back, mocking the police while she felt the van accelerate as the gang took advantage of the unexpected good fortune, but she knew this was only a temporary solution since the police wouldn't need long to find the gang.

Charlotte bit her lip as she tried to work out what she was going to do now. Ideally the van would stop so she could deal with the gang, and she cursed herself for not getting inside the van while the robbery had taken place but she had hoped she could do it away from the scene. But these amateurs had put paid to that plan.

An idea sprang to mind. She flicked her wand back into place and she cast a spell on the van itself, using her occlumency barriers to prevent the compulsions she was weaving into the gang to block them out for herself. It took a few minutes but the van eventually stopped off at a McDonalds after the compulsion charm she'd used on them made them go and grab something to eat. Charlotte grimaced. This idea was incredibly stupid and badly rushed instead of the carefully thought out plan she'd had originally. She unstuck herself and she jumped off the van, and she raced away before she removed the spell rendering her invisible to the naked eye before she conjured the tools she'd need to break into the van.

She went back to the van with her hood up and she worked quickly on the lock of the backdoors. It took her slightly longer than she'd hoped, and she cursed her lack of practice in breaking into vans and cars.

Once upon a time Charlotte had been considered one of the best carjackers, but she had let the skill become stale since the discovery of magic and the introduction of her custom made wands had allowed her to broaden her scope, so carjacking was no longer something she used to earn her living, and her skills were rusty.

Just as she was considering using one of her wands to break in, she sighed with relief as the lock clicked. "Thank the lord," she whispered, feeling her racing heart. She got into the van, wishing one of the gang had opted to stay in the van with the jewellery, it would have made things easier. "I swear on my parents' graves, I will never take such a skill for granted again. The moment I get home I will write a list of the things I need to really brush up upon…"

Any more self-recriminations were pushed aside when she took in the bags of jewellery. Granted it was a small haul, smaller than the gang had likely hoped for, but it was big enough for them. And for Charlotte.

She grinned and she emptied the lot into her backpack while she kept a watch for the gang. She unzipped her jacket and fingered her gun in the holster.

"Don't keep me waiting, will you boys?" she grinned while she continued emptying the bags.

Charlotte was in the van for a good half an hour before the gang came back, but by then she had already finished emptying the bags. She slowly pulled out the gun covered up, and she cocked it. She could hear the gang outside, chatting, but then her eyes widened in horror when she heard the sound of sirens drawing closer. The van doors swung open and they were about to climb inside but they caught sight of her sunglass covered features.

"Who the fuck are you?" one demanded eloquently.

Charlotte lifted the gun and fired it twice before she aimed a shot at the startled driver and the guy in the passenger seat. Charlotte smirked when she saw the last member of the gang runoff, but she decided to let him go. She didn't care what he did by this point, and besides, it was unlikely they would bump into each other again. In any case, she had to worry about the police.

She jumped out of the van just as they were coming up to the van. Charlotte watched them thoughtfully for a moment before she glanced down at her gun clasped in her hand. In the old days, she would have run but something was holding her back. For a moment Charlotte wondered what the problem was and she knew the police themselves were wondering what was going on in turn, but she realised quickly what it was.

Susan Bones had caused her to snap and now she wanted nothing more than to lash out at the world until her anger at it was abated. She knew it was risky, but with the police coming in she realised she had a nice outlet for her anger. She grinned and she raised her gun and opened fire. She shot one of the leading cars' windows and aimed another bullet at the front wheels. The bullet burst through the tire and it popped like a balloon, making it skid before it crashed into a streetlamp.

Charlotte fired again at the police, damaging more of the cars before she broke off into a run, shoving the gun into her pocket and zipping it shut while the police cars following the ones behind slammed on their brakes to avoid being shot at in turn. She raced through the streets, unsurprised when she heard the police behind her, knowing that they had recovered quickly after she'd shot at them. She'd only shot at a few cars while those other cars braked hard. With that, it wouldn't have taken them long to recover and pull out so they could chase her. What she'd just done was a surprise for London police, but they would adapt quickly if they hadn't already.

She knew the police were likely calling up the Armed Response Unit, or the SAS, or whomever they called in cases like this. She didn't care. It wouldn't matter one way or another, not if she could escape.

Let me see, she thought to herself as she scanned her surroundings, thankful for her jogs and other exercises while the police pursued her. No time to hide under a car…Err, no…I can't use a doorway…Ah! At last!

Granted while she knew an alleyway was corny and cliche, in this case, it was perfect. She raced down the alley until she found a number of wheelie bins. She grimaced at the stench.

"Hardly ideal, but needs must," she muttered to herself while she focused.

Meanwhile, at the end of the alley, DI Egham stepped out of his car, squinting into the darkness. He yawned loudly, uncaring if he was seen, but he hated night duty even if it was an occupational hazard, but he knew it disappointed his wife. In the meantime, he had something more on his mind than whether or not his thoughts about whether or not his wife was actually cheating on him or not were true.

The first was asking himself what the hell was going on. The call had come in from one of the shop-owners who had alerted the police that one of their neighbours, a jewellery shop, had been broken into, but the response had been noisy as hell which was the last thing Egham would have done. To make matters worse when they had gone in pursuit, one of the cars had suddenly suffered a puncture.

The second thing on his mind was trying to work out where that person with a gun had come from. Egham knew there had been a gang involved in the jewellery shop break-in, but from the look of it the new character had come in and wiped the lot out, although whether they knew about the jewellery heist or not, he couldn't tell. It would make more sense if they didn't know until they'd come across the loot in the back of the van after breaking into it.

Now they were going to have to cope with a potential shootout with a dark alley. Egham could understand the crooks' motive, of course; while they were small and light on their feet, the police had been gaining. Even the strongest athlete couldn't have lasted against those odds. But what was going on in the mind of that small criminal now? Were they planning on a shootout? Did they have another plan, if so what was it?

God, as if we don't need more mysteries or grief, especially following the Crown Jewel job, he grimaced, remembering the summer robbery which had been pulled off so meticulously and so brilliantly even now the best brains could not work out how it had been done, although the Louvre robbery had caught the French by surprise as well.

"When's Armed Response here?" he demanded of a DC.

"They should be here within half an hour."

Egham cursed. "That's wonderful. In the meantime, that guy is going to escape."

"Nothing they can do, sir," the DC replied, "they say it's the best they can estimate."

Egham sighed. "Are the other officers at the other entrances to this alley?"

"Yes. They're keeping watch, but its quiet, sir." the DC said.

"I don't understand what that guy is gonna do," Egham said aloud, voicing a thought that had popped in only now.

"It's like something out of a movie."

"Not all things are, Constable," Egham reminded the younger officer, turning to him briefly before looking back at the alley. He wished he wasn't the only senior officer here so then he could trade options of what they could be doing right now. Unfortunately, their options were limited in this case given how this one was armed and dangerous, otherwise, he would have ordered his men to follow without hesitation but even with their vests to protect them, coppers were not immortal.

He sighed as movement from the alley caught his eye. He immediately checked and he relaxed when he saw the sleek form of a cat slinking its way out. When the Armed Response team came in and searched the alley thoroughly, they found nothing and they had searched everywhere they could think of. In the end, it was assumed the gunman-gunwoman - whatever - had managed to find an exit they didn't know about, though they acknowledged it made little sense.

Little did they realise they had seen the thief escape.

XXX

Charlotte sighed as she landed on the ground. While she disliked portkey travel at the best of times, she had to admit being taught the skill by the Founders themselves was cool as well as helpful since she wasn't constantly using Dobby or Winky, but since her House-elves were busy at the moment with finding out more about the Second Task she didn't want to keep dragging them to her even if they would not complain.

Getting away from the police was simple, just transform into her animagus form, and slip past them to travel to another street, find a blindspot without CCTV anywhere, and then portkey home.

She looked at the mail on the table and she sighed when she saw one had come from the Daily Prophet offering a grovelling apology. Still, she wasn't bothered about that one until she read the next article. It had taken the goblins two days to hammer it into the Daily Prophet editors office the facts that she was the one holding all the cards, and she was grateful to them for that.

Ignoring the Prophet letter, Charlotte looked at the others before dismissing them when she came across a fairly large box with a letter attached. She picked it up and opened it after checking to see if it was harmless. A quick glance reminded her she had hired a group of solicitors to retrieve her parents things from Godric's Hollow.

Charlotte had learnt shortly after her eye had been destroyed the Ministry had taken some of her parents things in the hopes of creating a museum, completely dismissing the fact they were House Potter property, and she had used the new authority she had discovered which was connected to the Headship status she'd inherited as the last Potter to force the Ministry to give it all back to her.

The Ministry hadn't liked it, but she had told the solicitors to show no mercy. It had taken weeks and weeks, judging from the amount of time that had passed, but the Ministry had given in. She checked the letter and saw they'd had everything checked to make sure nothing had been tampered with. She frowned a little when she saw there had been a camera included that had been found by the Ministry who'd gone over the house's wreckage before they had just taken it with the film inside, and it hadn't been processed for years until now.

Charlotte picked up the box and ignored the post - she would get to it in the morning - and she took it upstairs to the living room suite. Once in the living room she turned on the TV and selected a Star Trek movie, desiring optimism instead of reality for once, and she opened the box. The first thing she saw on top was a plain brown parchment envelope.

The pictures, Charlotte guessed and she picked it up and opened it.

She chuckled as she saw the photos of Sirius' antics with Remus; while she currently hated the surviving Marauders for being backstabbers, she had to admit this was funny, and besides this collection had been snapped in a point of time when the Marauders were more carefree, but the fact the prime glue for their existence was alive at the time and wasn't dead meant their obligations hadn't changed.

She laughed when she saw Remus hex Sirius and made him tap dance so fast it looked as if Sirius was actually going to pull his feet off, and she definitely chuckled when she saw both Peter and Remus covered with what looked like paint. Charlotte snorted in amusement, a smile tugging on her lips as she saw Sirius and Remus seemingly oblivious while walking around with long ears in place of their own.

But her smile faded when she saw the next picture.

It was a picture of her mother holding her in her arms. Lily looked so happy and serene just holding her baby self in her arms, completely unaware of what was coming for her, her husband, and her daughter.

Charlotte looked at the picture beneath. This time her baby self was sitting astride a broomstick with her father, James' hair looked more unkempt than ever while Charlotte saw her baby self wearing a massive grin. Charlotte stroked the picture, barely recognising herself; in those days she'd been on with loving parents instead of magic-hating muggles who had hated her very existence, but she looked at James closely.

She started to cry. Charlotte bit her lip to stop the deluge, but after seeing her father's carefree smile and her mother's serene expression she decided to open the floodgates and she began to really sob.

"Why?" she whispered, sniffling as the tears trickled down her face from her remaining eye. "Why did they do it? Why did they take you from me?"

She hated getting like this. Ever since the day she had discovered the truth of her parent's deaths and how everyone had placed her on a pedestal, her attitude towards her parents had changed; in the past she had resented them for dying, for being worthless drunks like the Dursleys had painted them as, but when it had changed she had found love and affection for them she had never expected.

In any case, when she had seen how her parents were with her as a baby, her image of them as being diluted versions of Petunia and Vernon (insults against nature itself) who'd tolerated her had shattered forever and it never failed to make her cry.

Charlotte hugged the pictures of her parents to her chest, and all the pain she'd felt since the Tournament came around, the loss of her eye, it all came out as she hugged the pictures of her family to her heart.